Oh yes, you can still get salt pork. These days it's used more for flavoring. Can't make a Boston Clam Chowder or Baked beans without it. But Dixie has called it: super salted, you might as well drink a cup of melted lard.

We still take comfort in what was made in civilian homes: Country ham, potatoes, sweet potatoes, anything smothered in butter, pies, cakes, pork chops, pot roast. Your average agrarian had a root cellar. Turnips, potatoes, carrots, onions, cabbage, parsnips and other root crops would keep all winter. Some apple varieties store well, and those which didn't could be put up as apple butter and various sauces.

Poultry was a matter of grabbing the excess rooster or played-out hen -- with a decent-sized flock, there was always one or two of those. If you had the funds, barrels of oysters were not uncommon; melons and more fragile greens were available during the summer. And then, of course, there was bread.

I'm certain that in some communities, sausages and cheeses were made, although I can't recollect reading where these were widely distributed. Plenty of incidents of home-brew and hard-cider, though; and fresh, raw milk.

Some of what they ate is obviously out of favor with board members: head-cheese, haggis, scrapple ... but I suspect that we would be quite comfortable with the dinner table at any reasonably well-off person.